


old haunts are for forgotten ghosts

by fortymaliks



Category: One Direction (Band), Radio 1 RPF
Genre: Amnesia, M/M, Multi, Tomlinshaw - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-24
Updated: 2014-12-24
Packaged: 2018-03-03 07:06:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2842340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fortymaliks/pseuds/fortymaliks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“It’s the three of us, now,” Harry says, finally.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>  <i>Louis blinks.</i></p><p>  <i>“Like,” Harry rushes to clarify, “you, and me, and Nick.”</i></p><p> </p><p>Louis wakes up with amnesia, and learns that he's missing two whole years of his life. Two whole years, and some interesting developments...</p>
            </blockquote>





	old haunts are for forgotten ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to all my favs for reading this over for me: mrsyt31, loverave, and hostagesfic-s.
> 
> I know nothing about actual amnesia, but I'm quite in love with the trope, so this is quite.... tropey. Please suspend your disbelief, as it's all very surface-scratchy.
> 
> This takes place in two years from now, and it's set in a sort of canon-adjacent world in which Nick is still doing TBS, and 1D is on hiatus, but Harry is still doing something music-production related. Louis is doing songwriter/mentoring type things, but it's not mentioned.
> 
> <3 This was my schmoopy Christmas gift to myself, and to everyone who digs the trope as much as I do. <3

  
_So don't sing me your songs about the good times,_  
those days are gone and you should just let them go.  
And God help the man who says,  
"If you'd have known me when..."  
Old haunts are for forgotten ghosts.  
\- The Gaslight Anthem

***

The first thing Louis wants when he opens his eyes is Harry.

He asks for Harry, and then clears his throat and asks for a drink of water. He gets the water first, taking the cup from a nervous looking nurse. She seems unsure whether Louis can get a good grip, but when he finally holds on firmly enough, she backs away.

By the time he’s swallowed some down, several other people have bustled into the room, reaching out to check his pulse and scratch things down on a chart, flashing lights in his eyes and asking him to blink. Tons of people, but none of them are Harry yet.

He fights the drowsiness that threatens to pull him back down, desperate to see a familiar face, but it wins eventually, and he falls asleep again.

***

The second time he wakes up, Harry’s there.

“Harry,” Louis says weakly, and he’s there, holding tightly to his hand.

“Hey, Lou,” Harry says softly, squeezes his hand gently. Louis feels calm, suddenly, relaxed. He’s here and Harry’s here, and the nurse, and Nick Grimshaw…

He barely registers how close Nick is, no space between him and Harry at all at his bedside, and wait, now that he thinks about it, that’s Nick’s hand that’s a heavy weight on his thigh through the covers, and that’s weird, right? He thinks it’s weird, probably, but then his eyes flit back to Harry, and the warmth of Harry’s hand in his.

He’s about to speak again, to say something to Harry, hello, even, maybe, when the doctor hurries into the room.

“Good that you’re awake, Louis,” she says briskly, grabbing a clipboard off of the end of the bed and studying it. “Your friends have been quite worried.”

Louis can see Harry’s features twist into a frown as he steps back, followed by Nick Grimshaw, letting the doctor step up to Louis’ side. She flashes another light into his eyes, asks him to follow it, smiling pleasantly all the while.

The light hurts Louis’ head, slightly, and mostly he just wants her to step aside so that he can still see Harry.

“What’s your name?” the doctor asks him, scribbling something onto her pad. He answers her, and then asks for his water. She delivers it, and waits patiently while he takes a sip.

“Can you tell me what year it is?” she asks next, when he hands her back the water glass. She sets it aside.

“Two thousand fourteen,” Louis says, and he can hear the tiny gasp that Harry makes louder than the “hmm” from the doctor.

“Oh, dear,” she says.

***

It turns out that it’s actually two thousand and sixteen.

There are two whole years of Louis’ life missing, and it’s his brain’s fault.

Louis doesn’t question it when they tell him it was his own fault, that he probably shouldn’t have climbed as high on the ladder as he had. Harry had smiled quietly as he’d explained to Louis that he’d offered to hold the ladder, and Louis had declined.

He doesn’t quite understand what Nick Grimshaw’s got to do with anything, even as Nick chimes in to add to Harry’s story, describing how he’d offered to go up the ladder instead. He’s taller, after all, Nick had laughed, and he wouldn’t have needed to climb up so high.

Louis’ laying in a hospital bed with a brain injury, and he still knows that he’d never have allowed Nick Grimshaw to upstage him like that.

So that seems all in order, then.

What Louis can’t seem to figure out, though, is why Harry’s acting so strange with him.

He hasn’t kissed him, which is maybe not that off, considering that Louis’ assumably been lying in this bed for a good twenty four hours now without having brushed his teeth. And there’d been the hand holding, when he’d first woken up, that had been a comfort.

Harry hasn’t touched him since, though. He’s pulled up a chair beside the bed, and Nick has, too, and that’s probably the weirdest thing about it.

Harry’s friends with Nick, Louis knows, they go out sometimes on the weekends. Louis likes to stay home or go around to Zayn’s, smoke a bowl and play Xbox, and Harry’s more social. They’ve always been that way, and it’s never bothered either of them.

They have had the occasional fight over Nick Grimshaw being such a close friend, though (ending in a few choice tweets from Louis, and an internet feud in which even Zayn was involved), which is why it’s weird that he’s here now, so concerned. Louis might figure it to be that he’s trying to score points with Harry, but no, something about that doesn’t seem quite right.

It’s just weird that he’s got Nick Grimshaw here by his bedside, and he hasn’t even seen the other lads yet.

Harry speaks, knocking Louis out of his thoughts, and Louis turns to focus his attention on his words.

“So, like,” Harry’s voice is slow like molasses, sticky and deep. In the years he’s known Harry, he hasn’t stopped loving it. He’s glad to hear that it’s gotten a pitch deeper, even, in the last few years. “What is the last thing you remember?”

They sort out that Louis’ missing two entire tours, a wedding (Zayn and Pez actually saw it through, he’s kinda proud of them), two broken arms (both Niall), and an engagement (Gemma).

Louis listens carefully through the stories for a comforting anecdote about Harry and Louis together, something that will put his mind to rest about their relationship, about the way Harry is eyeing him nervously throughout the entire tale. He doesn’t hear it, though.

What he does hear is a lot more Nick Grimshaw than he’s expecting.

“You can go,” Louis starts, trying to get a lid on the sour feeling he’s got towards Grimshaw. He wants to say this as nicely as he can. It’d be nice to have Harry alone, is all. He can ask him… straight out ask him what Harry isn’t saying, put his fears to rest.

Nick’s eyebrow quirks up, questioning, a smile on his lips that only serves to annoy Louis more than he already is.

“I mean, you don’t have to stay here. You’ve probably got better things to do than sit at the bedside of some random popstar that you’ve made it quite clear you don’t even like. It’s alright, Saint Grimshaw. I’m sure by now Harry’s seen how nice you’re being. You’re good to go, fly free!”

Nick stills in his chair, glances at Harry with a worried expression. Harry reaches over almost out of instinct, sets his hand over top of Nick’s and squeezes.

Louis sees it all.

And he realizes.

Suddenly, he’s playing through the stories, how Nick had been present in almost all of them. How Nick hasn’t left Harry’s side since Louis had woken up, how they’d been there almost inseparable through his entire examination, through all the questions and tests. Harry had looked on worriedly, and Nick had been there beside him the whole time.

He feels a telltale hot sting at the corners of his eyes, as Nick stands up and Harry follows him.

He’s pretty much worked it out, what they’re not telling him about his relationship status.

The comfortable way Nick’s hand slips to Harry’s hip, just a quick flash before it’s pulled away again, like he doesn’t want Louis to spot it. They way they’re standing so close and don’t even realize they’re doing it.

Harry’s standing, now, but he’s still frowning. In his head, Louis is waiting for somebody to speak. He’s almost daring Harry to speak up, to tell Nick he doesn’t have to leave. When he finally does open his mouth, Louis almost holds his breath.

“Louis, Nick is…”

“I think he’s just tired, we should let him rest,” Nick rushes to interrupt Harry. Harry stops, turning a puzzled look in Nick’s direction. They lock eyes for a moment, like they’re having some sort of conversation that Louis isn’t part of.

Louis used to have those kinds of conversations with Harry, too.

He can read this one, he thinks, bitterly. Nick doesn’t want to tell Louis that he’s with Harry, now. That somehow that world has spun on it’s axis and is now a place where Louis and Harry aren’t LouisandHarry anymore.

Well, Louis isn’t about to make it easier on him. He wants to hear them _say_ it.

“Nick, he needs to know that…”

“Nope,” Nick says, his voice high and squeaky with panic. He get a grip on Harry’s arm, pulls him towards the door.

Pulls him away from Louis.

Louis’ chest feels tight when he sees Harry sigh, and move to follow Nick out the door.

“Night, Lou,” he says softly, “We’ll talk in the morning and get this sorted.”

“No worries,” Louis makes himself say. He hopes Harry can’t hear the shake in his voice. He doesn’t let any tears spill out until the door clicks shut after him.

***

Louis is so happy to see Zayn that when he walks through the door, Louis immediately fists his hands in the soft leather of his jacket and refuses to let go.

“Get off me,” Zayn says, but it’s fond. Louis can hear his smile, even while his face is pressed into Zayn’s neck.

They separate after a few beats, and Zayn steps back so that Louis can see him properly. He’s got more facial hair than Louis remembers, but that’s not strange, since Zayn’s always been a fan of experimenting. 

“I’ve got pictures in my phone, and like, thought we could look at them.”

Zayn perches on the edge of Louis’ bed and they look through pictures together, one after another. They’re all familiar pictures, but things that Louis can’t remember. It’s weird, seeing himself doing things he doesn’t know that he did.

“Not quite sure how I managed to miss your birthday,” Louis says, when the pictures change to Zayn grinning up from a Green Lantern cake, “I’m sorry I’m apparently such a shite friend.”

“Nah, mate, Pete was in the hospital, you had to go, I understood.” Zayn catches Louis’ frown and misinterprets it, because he rushes to add, “he’s fine, he’s fine. Just a blood pressure scare or something.”

Louis’ brain scrambles to remember a Pete. He’s pretty sure he doesn’t have any friends named Pete. At least none from before a year ago.

“This is embarrassing,” Louis says, quietly, “but I’m not sure who Pete is.”

“Ah, right,” Zayn blinks, “Grimshaw. Pete Grimshaw. Grimmy’s dad.”

“Oh. Right,” Louis’ nodding like it makes perfect sense, and Zayn turns back to thumb through more pictures. Except, it still doesn’t make sense to him, and god, he can’t ask further, he can’t.

Tears spring to his eyes, a feeling he’s gotten used to in the last few hours. It’s so frustrating to have to ask to have your entire life explained to you, again and again.

“I’m sorry, I don’t,” Louis cuts himself off, tries to swallow around the lump forming in his throat.

“Lou, hey,” Zayn’s voice is soft, but fierce. “Don’t fucking apologize.”

“Sorry,” he says again, and then winces, “I just. I feel like such an asshole.”

“Ask me anything. Total immunity, just you and me.” Zayn

“How am I okay without him?” Louis says it in such a small voice, he’s not sure Zayn will hear. He’s slouched so far down in the bed that he thinks if he just slouches down a few more inches, he can maybe disappear forever.

Zayn must know what he means, he’s got to.

“Without who?” Zayn asks.

“Harry, obviously.”

Zayn blinks at him. “Louis, you just saw Harry not even an hour ago.”

“Listen,” Louis says, angry now, tired and heartbroken and frustrated, “you know what I mean. He’s not…”

He trails off, willing his voice not to break. He takes a deep breath, and then another, very carefully not looking Zayn in the eyes.

“He’s not… with me, anymore. And nobody’s come out and told me yet, but it’s pretty fucking clear he’s with Nick now…”

“Fuck off,” Zayn interrupts. The fierce disbelief in his voice stops Louis’ thoughts in their tracks. The tears that had been threatening to spill are halted as Zayn jumps up off of the bed.

“They didn’t tell you? Are you fucking kidding me?”

Zayn’s at the door before Louis even thinks about asking him what he’s talking about.

“I’ll kill them,” Zayn says, “I’m going to kill them.”

***

It’s like hearing a story about somebody else’s life, when they tell him.

Harry’s standing at the foot of the hospital bed, curls long around his face. Louis likes the look on him, it’s new. Or at least to him it is.

Zayn is by the door, arms folded in front of him. He’s returned after abandoning Louis earlier with a nervous looking Harry, and had stationed himself in front of the exit after pressing Harry into the room in front of him. Grimshaw had followed them both.

He’s hovering by Zayn, now, by the door. Louis almost opens his mouth to tell Nick to feel free to use it, but he doesn’t want to interrupt whatever it is that Harry’s going to tell him. He needs to hear it.

If Harry’s left him for Nick, he needs to hear him say it.

He’s blindsided, of course.

“We’re still together, Lou,” Harry says, vehemently, “how could you even… oh my god, Louis. I love you so much, you asshole, we’re just.”

He pauses, and Louis waits, seconds stretching into eternities in which Louis can do nothing but wonder where the hell this is all going.

“It’s the three of us, now,” Harry says, finally, shoulders slumping like he’s disappointed in the words he’s using.

Louis blinks.

“Like,” Harry rushes to clarify, “you, and me, and Nick.”

Louis spares a glance in Nick Grimshaw’s direction. He nods softly, eyes wide like Louis is a spooked animal.

“What…” Louis can’t find words. Him and Harry… and Nick? Does that mean he and Nick are…

“Nick and you and me. We’re in a relationship. The three of us. For over a year, now,” Harry finishes, the small smile when he says it not quite reaching his eyes.

There’s a beat of silence. Louis blinks again. And then all at once, the words sink in.

“There’s no fucking way,” Louis exclaims, because quite frankly, he’s sure it can not possibly be the truth.

“Thanks very much,” Grimshaw says, “brilliant. Lovely.”

“It’s…” His throat feels like it’s about to close up, the stinging threat of a sob trying to push it’s way out. “It’s not true, I don’t even…”

“It’s true, Lou,” Zayn steps in to say, pulling his phone out once more, thumbing across the screen before he selects something. He steps up on Louis’ left, turns the screen to him.

The photo is dark, slightly grainy like it’d been taken without a flash. They’re in a pub, a booth, it looks like, across a table from whoever took the photo, Zayn, obviously, and they’re…

Louis’ breath catches to see it, Harry’s right hip snug against Louis’ left, their sides pressed together easily, as Harry’s lips wrap around the straw sticking out of his drink. He’s watching Louis fondly, eyes crinkled happily.

And Louis is… well. Louis’ always been a handsy drunk, fond of a cuddle. It’s familiar to him, the way he’s got his nose tucked into Nick Grimshaw’s neck, the way he’s almost half in his fucking lap. Nick’s got his arm slung around Louis’ shoulders, but he’s watching Harry in the picture, even as he drops a kiss to Louis’ hair. It’s. Intimate. They look. Intimate.

He doesn’t say anything, just swipes left on the screen to the next picture.

Nick is laughing and batting Louis’ hand away from his hair, Harry nearly doubled over in glee.

Next one, Harry laying across both of their laps, Nick reaching for his drink, Louis clearly poised to hit Harry in the balls.

Next one, Harry out of the shot, on the floor, if the way Nick and Louis are looking down and howling with laughter is any indication.

Next one, the three of them somewhat more composed as they smile at the actual camera.

He drops the phone onto the bed, his stomach rolling. He doesn’t remember this. He doesn’t remember any of this.

“I don’t remember this,” Louis knows he’s barely whispering, but he can feel something like panic starting to gather in his chest. “I don’t remember being… him, he’s. I don’t even _like you_.”

He’s looking at Nick now, not angry, just confused, and he can see the hurt that flickers across Nick’s features, but he can’t process it. He doesn’t fucking remember anything.

“Louis, come on,” Harry says, quietly, “hey, Nick is…” He’s kneeing his way onto the mattress besides Louis, the awful, papery hospital bedsheets crinkling under his weight.

“Stop,” Louis says, urgent now. He thinks that he might jump out of this bed to get away from Harry, now. “No, don’t, don't touch me, I can't...”

Harry freezes, face stricken, and Louis hurries to explain, but he’s not sure he can.

Luckily, Nick speaks up.

“Haz, come on,” Nick says. “Let’s give him some space, maybe.”

The gratefulness that Louis feels is possibly the first positive emotion he’s ever had towards Nick Grimshaw in his life.

Well. The first one that he remembers, apparently.

“Harry,” Louis’ voice is just a little more than a whisper now, “please, just…”

Louis has forgotten a lot of things, but he hasn’t forgotten what it looks like when Harry is devastated. Nick is by the bed, pulling Harry gently down and off.

Harry pauses at the door, eyes rimmed red, glancing back. Louis looks away.

He waits until he hears the door shut before breaking down.

***

Once he’s slept on it, it doesn’t seem any more likely. It does, however, seem less like a knife in the gut.

He opens his eyes to the morning sunlight streaming in through his curtains, sitting up so that he can drink the tea that’s been left on his bedside table. It’s not as hot as Louis would like, partial to tea that’s almost scalding, but it’s still warm, which is better than Louis had been expecting.

He drinks it while he tries to console himself with the fact that apparently, he’s still got Harry.

Harry hasn’t left him. He thinks the sentence in his head, a few times, and it makes him feel more steady.

Harry hasn’t left him. He’s just gained a…

Nick Grimshaw?

He still can’t help the cold jealousy that festers low in his stomach at the thought of Harry and Nick together. Does it help if it’s Harry and Nick and _him_?

He thinks of Nick, his tall, lanky frame, and his strong, long fingers, last seen wrapped around Harry’s bicep as he led him out of Louis’ room and into the hall.

He thinks of Nick’s kind eyes and his biting words, and the way he’s never liked Louis, not ever, even back in the early days of radio promo. 

Just like that, he’s frustrated again, angry at himself for not being able to remember his entire life. It’s his fault that there are big gaps everywhere, and he hates that. He hates everything about this.

Reaching to set his cup back down, so that he’s less tempted to throw it against the wall to hear it’s satisfying shatter, he’s startled out of his thoughts by the clearing of a throat at his door.

Nick Grimshaw stands there, lifting a hand in a half-aborted wave.

“Think of the devil, and he shall appear,” Louis mutters, raising an eyebrow.

“Thinking of me?” Nick says, because of course that’s what he’d pick up from that. Louis flushes as Nick makes his way into the room.

He steps up to the bed, and Louis can’t help wonder what Nick knows about him now. Nick knows all of his secrets, and Louis barely knows him. It makes him angry.

Louis peers down at Nick Grimshaw, hovering around the foot of his bed. His hands are picking at the edge of the covers, like he doesn’t know what to do with them.

Louis narrows his eyes.

“I know you’re in love with him,” Louis says.

Nick looks up, a frustrated, long-suffering gaze that Louis doesn’t like.

“I’m in love with you both, you bloody idiot.”

“Never,” Louis spits, “disgusting.”

Nick rolls his eyes. “Good lord, didn’t think I’d ever have to go back to this point again.”

“Which point is that?”

“You being a complete arse to me every chance you get.”

“Not sure how you ever managed to get around it in the first place.”

“With my cock in your mouth, mostly.” Nick deadpans, and Louis doesn’t really have a good comeback for that.

“Couldn’t have been that memorable, I guess,” Louis says eventually. He can feel the heat creeping into his cheeks, knows Nick can see it.

“Lou,” Nick says sadly, trailing off. They watch each other for a moment, a strange standoff that Louis doesn’t necessarily find uncomfortable.

“Where’s Harry?” Louis asks, finally.

He doesn’t expect it to hit Nick like a punch, but it does, for some reason.

“It took me a long time to get over this feeling,” he says, laughing sadly, running a hand through his hair.

“What are you talking about?”

“In the beginning, coming into your… what you two had. It was hard to, like, feel like I wasn’t intruding.”

Probably because you were, Louis doesn’t say. He doesn’t know, does he?

“Harry, he’d try to make it up to me, try to show me how much you two loved me, but you…” Nick broke off, chuckling softly. “You’d just look at me and say, ‘stop being an idiot’, and that was that.”

“I’m sorry,” Louis says, interrupting the story so that he doesn’t have to think about how much that sounds exactly like something he would say, “you must realize… how weird this is to me. I literally barely remember even having spoken to you, and now you’re here telling me we’re in a relationship. It’s bizarre. It’s… it seems insane.”

“Sorry,” Nick says, shrugging helplessly. He collapses down into the chair that Louis has now come to think of as his. “Harry had some meetings he couldn’t cancel. I told him I’d come by.”

Louis lets himself slide down into his bed. He takes a deep breath and then lets it out again. If he doesn’t think about it too much, he won’t be so frustrated.

“Tell me about that,” Louis says, happy to have something to distract him, “tell me about what Harry does now.”

Nick obliges, clearly also glad to have a purpose. Louis sighs, and lets himself relax listening to one of Britain's most famous voices.

***

It’s at around the week and a half mark that he starts to get cabin fever.

He feels trapped in his bed, his head feeling better now. The pain goes away almost completely, with his pain killers, and Louis’ never been someone who can stay still for very long.

Niall and Liam have both been in to see him. His mum’s brought the kids in, which was upsetting enough. Ernest and Doris aren’t babies anymore, thanks to his lost years (as Niall had jokingly referred to them), and the girls are all teenagers. Zayn’s been in the most often, aside from Harry and, wonderingly, Nick.

Someone stays with him most nights, and it’s usually Harry, but a few times, it’s been Nick, when Louis had recognized the dark circles that Harry starts sporting when he hasn’t been sleeping well. Louis’ more bored on nights that Nick stays, keeping stubbornly quiet in his bed, eyes trained on the television to avoid looking at Nick and wondering if Nick really loves him like everyone claims he does, and how on earth that’s possible.

He’s starting to go mad with the waiting, the endless rotation of friends and nurses, and no news from the doctors.

He’s already snapped at several people by the time Harry and Nick get back from  
whatever they’ve been doing all afternoon. He’d usually ask, desperate to fill the hours with something, but today he just doesn’t fucking care.

Ten minutes haven’t even passed by the time they really clue in to Louis’ mood. Somehow, that just makes him angrier.

It’s after he’s insulted Harry’s sweater, told Nick he’d sounded like shit on the radio this morning, and systematically found a flaw in every story Harry’s tried to tell him that Nick breaks.

He gets to his feet, rubbing his palms flat against his jeans as he stands. Louis’ not sure how he knows, but it’s something Nick does when he’s angry.

“I’ll just get you some tea,” Nick starts for the door, but Louis protests.

“I don’t want you to, you’ll muck it up,” he says stubbornly, “Harry can get it.”

“I know how you take your bloody tea, Louis,” Nick says through his teeth. He’d been with Louis the night before, and Louis knows how little sleep he’s had. For some reason, he can stop pushing, though. Something’s gotta give.

“So you claim,” Louis scoffs.

“Don’t be an arsehole,” Harry scolds, and Louis rolls his eyes at him.

“I’ll be back in a few,” Nick says, turning to go, but he doesn’t quite make it to the door.

“Don’t fucking bother,” Louis says, “I didn’t ask you to be here.”

The words hang in the air for a moment, the only sound a sucked in breath from Harry’s direction.

Louis just wants everybody to go away. He wants to go away, himself. As far as he possibly can from this room and this hospital and this entire situation.

“Louis,” Harry starts, but before he can get whatever diatribe he’s got in mind past his lips, Nick is stopping him, eyes cast downward to the floor. 

“It’s fine, Haz, I’ll just go…”

“No!” Harry shouts, striding over to get a firm grip on Nick’s arm. “He’ll remember that he’s head over heels for you eventually! Until then, he’s going to have to deal with it.”

“I’m the one who can’t deal with it! I can’t fucking deal with it!” Nick explodes, wrenching his arm out of Harry’s hold. Louis’ never heard him shout before.

“Nick,” Harry is hesitant, hurt, but Nick keeps talking over him, as if Louis isn’t even in the room with them.

“It’s all about how he’s dealing with it, yeah, he’s bloody brained himself and I’m fucking beside myself about it. But while you’re busy trying to patch things up between us, think for a moment about how it feels to be so bloody in love with someone who hates your fucking guts.”

“Nick,” Harry chokes out, again. He’s crying now, actually crying.

“I’m going,” Nick says, face softening, like he can’t stand to see Harry so upset. He looks on the verge of tears himself, and now that Louis mentions it, he’s on that edge, too, frustrated and upset and angry. “I can’t stay here, Harry.” 

Nick disappears, and Harry stands frozen in place.

“Haz,” Louis whispers, regret burning through his veins. He’d pushed until he’d finally got a reaction out of Nick. It’s not as satisfying as he’d thought it might be, though.

Louis is well acquainted with disguising hurt with anger, so he can recognize it pretty easily when he sees it. Nick had definitely been hurt. Louis had hurt him. He’s not sure he likes how that feels.

He says Harry’s name again, and this time, Harry acknowledges it.

“Shut up, Louis,” Harry says, through tears, and he follows Nick out the door.

***

Louis hadn’t thought that it could be possible for him to feel worse than he had, but he thinks he’s maybe found a new low. He waits, but it’s Zayn who shows up with an overnight bag later, setting it on the floor and raising an eyebrow at Louis.

“What did you do?” he asks, coming over to the edge of the bed and leaning there.

“I’m so tired, and I’m confused,” Louis says, in a voice smaller than he feels. “I’m scared, Z. What if I…”

He stops, starts again.

“I’m just so fucking terrified that I’m never going to remember. That I’m going to feel like I had Harry and everything was perfect one minute, and then I woke up one day and Harry didn’t love only me anymore. That I have to make room in my life forever for somebody I don’t even know. What if I don’t ever remember, Zayn? What if I can’t?”

“Oh, Lou,” Zayn sighs, leaning forward until his forehead is against Louis’. He palms the back of Louis’ head, pressed their heads together fiercely.

“You’re gonna be fine,” Zayn promises, letting him go and sitting back, “I know it feels crazy, mate, because you don’t know anything. But I’ve seen it. I’ve seen how much you love Nick Grimshaw, and I fucking know, babe, you don’t have to tell me how bizarre it is. I nearly drove you to an institution myself when you finally told me.”

Louis huffs out a laugh, remembering how Zayn’s always had his back. Fuck, he loves Zayn.

“You love Nick, Lou. And if you don’t remember, I think you’ll feel it, soon enough. Because love exists somewhere deeper, right? Inside, or some shit, I don’t fucking know. All I know is, you might not be able to remember things that happened and every moment of it, but you’ll feel it. And you won’t have to remember, because you’ll just know.”

“Jesus Christ,” Louis jokes, ignoring the tears that he can feel prickling at the edges of his vision, “how fucking high are you right now?”

Zayn laughs, big and loud, just like Louis remembers.

***

Zayn leaves the next morning, but Harry still doesn’t come back. He figures he’ll be back tonight, because there’s no way anyone is getting Zayn to give up his bed two nights in a row, so he sits quietly and waits.

He watches TV to pass the time, and chats quietly with the nurses, apologizing for his mood yesterday. They wave him off with a tsk and a flick of their wrists, like they hear it all the time, but Louis still feels shit about it.

After supper, when Louis looks anxiously to the door to see if anyone will actually turn up to keep him company overnight, he’s surprised to see not Harry standing awkwardly in the doorway, but Nick Grimshaw.

“Hi,” Nick says, looking down at his feet.

“Hi,” Louis breathes, overwhelmed for some reason. He’s grateful that Nick came. He wants him to stay.

“I need you to hug me.” Nick says. His eyes are tired, face slack like he’s given up, but he moves into the room until he’s standing beside Louis’ bed.

“Excuse me?”

“You told me,” Nick says, looking for all the world like he’s forcing each word out of his mouth, “you said that you’d always be here for me. That if I ever needed you, you’d have my back.”

Louis’ not sure what to say to that. He focuses on breathing, instead, in and out.

“‘Even if you’re being chased by bloody fifty screaming Directioners’, you said. I was being reprimanded because my numbers had dropped. Had to stop you from going in to big boss Ben Cooper yourself.”

That does… somewhat sound like something he’d say. He peers up at Nick.

He looks like he’d rather be anywhere else, hands trembling even as they’re folded across his chest.

“I know you don’t remember promising me that,” Nick says softly, desperation plain on his face, “but. I need you. I need you, just. Please. One hug and then I’ll leave, I’ll leave you alone.”

When Louis reaches towards him, it’s instinctive.

Nick sobs out a breath and clings, his arms wrapping around Louis’ as he buries his face in Louis’ neck.

“Hey,” Louis hushes, “shhh, hey.”

“Lou, god, Louis,” Nick’s voice is frantic now, as he twists his hands in Louis’ sweater.

His shoulders are shaking, though he isn’t crying out loud. Louis curls himself up smaller, moves over, and doesn’t really even register that he’s pulling Nick up on the bed until he’s done it and Nick is folded up around him.

There’s something familiar about it, but Louis can’t think about that right now, he can only shush him gently, and push his hair out of his eyes and let him cling to Louis.

Louis’ always had a protective streak, and he tells himself that’s all this is, as he holds Nick tightly. He hopes nobody comes in and finds them like this.

Nick falls asleep before Louis, and it’s uncomfortable, but Louis can’t bring himself to wake him.

Louis studies his face, peaceful now that he’s sleeping. He’s quite handsome, Nick Grimshaw is, Louis lets himself admit now, in the dark, where there’s nobody else around to read it on his face. It’s an unconventional type of attractiveness, quirky, but somehow the features all work for him, together. He’s got a kind face. Louis’ always thought so, not that he’d ever mention it to anyone in a million years.

He can’t really blame Harry, he supposes, for falling for him. Nick’s always so open, so happy, more like Harry in that respect. Louis can admit that maybe he’d find that attractive. That must be what it was, maybe. Louis really hates that he doesn’t know.

They all tell him he’s in love with this man, this man that he’s never even liked. It kills him that he doesn’t know why.

Nick knows secrets about him, what he looks like when he cries, the noises he makes when he gets off... Louis blushes at that one; he hasn’t let himself think about how he and Harry and Nick must be in bed together. He literally can’t fathom it, he’s never even been with a man apart from Harry.

It’s frustrating to think about.

He drifts off, eventually, Nick’s steady breathing and the warmth of another body lulling him into a fitful sleep.

When Louis wakes up a few hours later, he’s alone in the bed. When his eyes adjust to the dull light, there’s a napkin on his table that just says, “thanks -N”.

He doesn’t see Nick for the rest of the time he’s in the hospital, and he can’t bring himself to ask Harry about him.

***

As weird as it feels to be at Zayn’s, Louis can’t even fathom how weird it would be if he’d gone home to what is apparently his place.

They live together, him and Harry and Nick. Harry had sounded almost apologetic when he’d told him, wringing his hands together, the little furrow between his eyebrows that Louis’ still fond of after all these years.

The doctors had told him he could go home, on the condition that he come back for weekly assessment and that he keep them updated on any changes in his condition. Louis was glad, so incredibly relieved, until Harry had awkwardly cleared his throat across the room and filled Louis in on what “home” was now.

He’d tried not to look too uncomfortable about it all, certain that Harry would have asked Nick to leave for a bit, maybe, sleep at a friend’s or something. 

Louis’ been around Nick enough in the past few weeks to know he would have done it. For some reason, no matter how many insults Louis hurls at Nick, he’d never seemed to actually leave him. At first Louis thought it was because of Harry, that Nick must put up with Louis because he can’t have Harry without Louis.

He’s starting to get the feeling that he’s been wrong about that, though. Nick’s quiet snickering when he’d teased Harry, the way he fiercely took Louis’ side when Zayn and Harry tried to make him take sleeping pills that make him groggy and disoriented, the way Louis caught Nick watching him sometimes, like when they’d all been distracted by Harry telling a story about the vending machines in the hospital lounge...

Louis doesn’t feel comfortable calling somewhere with Nick home just yet, but he knows that he can’t kick Nick out of his own place. Louis won’t do that to him.

The protective feeling is new, and yet somehow not.

He’d been grateful when Zayn had spoken up and offered Louis his guest room while he’s getting his feet back under him.

It’s a cozy enough room, and Perrie is lovely about it, telling Louis she’d changed the sheets from yellow to a deep emerald because she thought Louis would like them better. She hasn’t changed at all, which is a comfort, and they tease each other like they always have, laughing and smiling. She lets him help her with clean up after dinner, which makes him feel less useless.

He and Zayn play Fifa and watch films, and Harry comes to visit. Liam and Niall come over after a few days, Liam crushing him in a hug and Niall pressing a case of beer into his arms.

They drink that night, and it’s almost like Louis remembers it. There’s a moment when Harry gets up to get another beer from the kitchen, and Louis holds up his empty bottle in a bid for a new one. Harry laughs, takes the bottle from him, leaning in to give him a quick peck on the lips when he does.

It’s the first time they’ve kissed in forever, it seems like, and they both realize it at the same time and freeze. After a beat, Harry pulls away hastily and makes for the kitchen.

Louis follows, well aware that he’s being watched by the others, but he doesn’t care.

He hesitates in the kitchen doorway. Harry’s got both of his hands on the countertop, standing still, eyes closed like he’s taking a moment.

“Haz,” Louis says, and Harry opens his eyes, looks up at him.

Harry smiles ruefully, holds a hand up.

“Better not come any closer just now, Lou,” he says, smiling sadly. “It’s actually insane how badly I want to kiss you right now.”

“Harry, please,” Louis takes a step, then stops himself, “please.”

“God, I want to,” Harry breathes, and before Louis knows what’s happening, they’ve met each other halfway, Harry’s arms catching Louis around his waist, fingers digging in hard as he presses his forehead to Louis’.

Louis can feel Harry’s words on his lips when he says them, just a whisper of a touch, barely there at all.

“It wouldn’t be fair,” Harry says, fingers pressing harder. Louis clings right back, arms wrapped around shoulders that only seem to have gotten broader in the years Louis is missing.

“Just once,” Louis pleads, ghosts of words, and then he’s won, because Harry’s lips are against his, soft and firm and familiar.

The drag of Harry’s mouth against his is so recognizable that Louis thinks he might not ever need his memories back, if only he could just have this forever.

He brings a hand up to grasp the back of Harry’s neck, hold him more firmly as he parts Harry’s lips to lick inside. Harry makes a sound in the back of his throat, a tiny, adorable growl that Louis knows he’s heard before, and then he’s meeting Louis’ tongue with his own. It’s so practiced that Louis has no doubt that they’ve done this a hundred times, and yet it’s apparently never gotten old. He wants to do it a hundred times more, but…

“Nick,” Harry gasps, pulling away with a look on his face that says he’d rather do anything but. He takes a quick step backwards, almost stumbling, and then a second. He reaches out, though, a hand anchored on Louis’ arm, like he’s reluctant to stop them from touching completely.

“I’ve got to…” Harry trails off, casting his eyes to the door.

“Get home, yeah,” Louis finishes for him, still breathing hard. Harry’s hand on him is searing, all his nerves are on fire.

“S’not home without you there,” Harry sniffles, “me and Nick both think so.”

Louis blinks at him, and lets himself picture it for a moment, the three of them cuddled up on their couch, the bad reality television shows Louis has a proclivity for droning on in the background. It’s nice, in his mind.

He pulls back, though, shaking his head.

“Right,” he tells Harry, “better go tell the boys you’re off.”

“Right,” Harry says, frowning, and they head back to the den together.

***

Later that night, Louis picks up his phone (a newer model that he hadn’t recognized, but muscle memory had him thumbing through it as easily as if he’d been using it for months). Biting his lip, he opens his messages, finds the contact he’s looking for, and starts scrolling through the texts there.

He’s in Louis’ phone as “Nicholas, <3”, and he has to scroll past several newer text threads with Harry, Zayn, Niall and his sisters to find him. He’d been reluctant to read it, up until now, not having wanted to read through conversations he doesn’t remember having had, with someone he’d barely even known.

He feels like he knows Nick a bit more now, or at least, he trusts that he is supposed to. He opens the thread.

The last text he has from Nick was the day before his fall, just a simple, “pick me up some digestives on your way home, love”, followed by a string of tea emojis. Louis had answered him with a simple, “no”, and then a palm tree.

Louis laughs to himself, wondering whether he’d actually gotten the biscuits or not. Something in his gut tells him he had. He thinks he definitely would have. He scrolls up further.

“You’ll never guess what Fifi brought to the station today” is next, and Louis settles down further into his bed, the glow of his screen the only light, as he reads text after text.

He finds himself laughing out loud at parts (“do you think it’d be hard to keep a goat? I found one that looks a bit like your Daisy…”) and shaking his head fondly at others (“Spilled ink on the McQueen… don’t tell H, I’m hoping he doesn’t remember that it’s actually his”). By the time he’s at the cut off of the messages, he finds himself wishing there were more.

Before he puts his phone down, he swipes back to a message that had made his breath catch in his throat, and he reads through it several times.

“Be home in five,” it says, and then, “love you.”

Louis stares at his own response until the words blur together on the screen. He’d sent back, simply, “love you.”

***

It’s not sneaky, really, if it’s his house.

Louis finds the key in the bottom of his coat pocket, with his wallet and some change. He waits until he knows Harry has a meeting, when he knows Nick is still at the station. It feels sneaky, but it’s not. He just wants to look.

He bullies the address out of Zayn, who’s still half asleep and only gives it to him so that he’ll get out of his bedroom. He’s sure that if Zayn were more alert, he’d quiz Louis on why he’s going there, maybe even offer to go with him, but Louis doesn’t want him to, and he’s grateful.

He gets out of the car, is pleased to note that there aren’t any people around, paps or otherwise. They’re still a thing, he’d realized, the day they’d let him leave the hospital. A few had yelled Harry’s name as they’d made for the car that Perrie had been waiting with, and he’d heard his name, too. He’d tried his best to forget the small, “Harry, where’s Nick?” that he’d heard shouted from the crowd as he’d ducked inside the vehicle, Harry grasping tightly to his hand and smiling at him.

There’s nobody around now, though, as he walks up a long walkway to the front door of the house that is his and Harry’s and Nick’s.

The front door opens to a large, open space. Louis can see a staircase disappearing up in front of him, and a kitchen to the right. He kicks his shoes off and wanders in, running a hand over the countertop.

There are two teacups beside the sink, a few dirty plates. He wonders if Nick and Harry had their tea together this morning, or whether Harry still inexplicably prefers coffee. Spying a coffee maker on the counter, Louis finds that he’s glad to see that he still does. It’s one more thing about Harry that hasn’t changed. Harry is solid and constant, and Louis loves him.

The bedrooms upstairs are harder to look at.

He walks past three guest bedrooms, all clean and set up nicely, but not lived in, before he comes to what is very obviously their room.

It’s a wreck, Louis notices, fondly. They haven’t made the bed, which is in the center of the room, massive and comfortable. There are clothes littered everywhere. Books piled high on the night table, a few watches scattered over the dresser. Louis’ breath catches when he sees a familiar sweater, worn and soft and green. It’s his favorite one, and he feels a lump in his throat as he picks it up from where it’s thrown over an armchair in the corner.

He can see himself, here. He sees how his stuff fits, opening the closet. His clothing, some familiar and some less so but instinctively his, hanging in among the patterned, flowered shirts that must be Harry’s or Nick’s. He sees his Vans on the floor of the closet, next to well-loved Chelsea boots. His things look right at home here, with Nick’s and Harry’s. He can see how it fits. He can see how he fits.

He sits down on the bed (his bed, Louis tells himself, it’s his bed), and lets himself fall backwards into it. It’s so cosy to burrow into the duvet. He can smell Harry’s Tom Ford, and a little bit of something he’s recognized from the past few weeks as Nick’s soap.

He’s been here before, he feels it, and it helps him relax. He only means to close his eyes for a moment, because everything is so comfortable and safe here. He closes his eyes and slips away into the feeling that for the first time in weeks, he's exactly where he belongs.

***

Louis wakes to Nick calling his name from downstairs.

“What the bloody hell, Nicholas,” Louis mutters to himself more than anyone. He glances at their clock, which says it’s half past noon, and there’s absolutely no reason that Nick would have to come home from work and make such a racket.

He can hear Nick coming up the stairs and makes a mental note to throw something at him when he comes into the room.

He’s reaching over the side of the bed for one of Nick’s favorite slippers when Nick appears at the door.

“How many times have I told you these slippers are the stupidest things,” Louis ponders, picking one up and examining it. He tosses it at Nick. It smacks him in the chest and falls to the floor.

Nick doesn’t move, which is weird. He’s come to expect fond, exasperated smirks and sarcasm in reaction to Louis’ general shitheadedness, but Nick is frozen now, staring at Louis like he’s grown a few extra heads.

Nick’s eyes are wide, his fingers tight on the door frame.

“Louis…” he chokes out, and suddenly, Louis remembers.

He remembers.

“I remember,” he whispers, more to himself than to Nick, and then louder, “holy shit, I remember!”

It comes back to him, the hospital, the accident, Harry and… oh, bloody hell, Nick.

He’s out of the bed before he can process a single other thing, wrapping himself around Nick with so much force he nearly knocks him over.

“Nick, fuck, I’m sorry, oh god, Nick,” Louis’ arms are locked in a vice grip, he clings harder than he’s ever clung to anything in his life. “I love you, I love you, fuck, I love you so much.”

He feels Nick’s arms come up around him, squeezing the air out of him until he can’t breathe. He’s not sure he wants to breathe, if it means he can have Nick like this. If it means Nick forgives him.

“I’m so fucking sorry,” Louis says into the warm solid of Nick’s chest. Somehow, Nick manages to squeeze tighter.

“Not your fault, love,” Nick chokes out, “Louis. Thank god, I couldn’t…”

Louis stops his thoughts by pressing his lips against Nick’s, a soft, light touch that Nick immediately chases. Nick brings his hands up to cup Louis’ jaw firmly and touches their lips together again, harder this time, stealing Louis’ air.

“Lou?” they both turn, see Harry at the door, eyes wide.

Louis launches himself at Harry, yanks Nick with him. The three of them stumble backwards, a pile of limbs and curses and laughter.

“You… you remember, then?” Harry asks, holding Louis tightly, as Nick presses a kiss to his head.

“Yeah,” Louis breathes, looking back and forth between Harry and Nick, “yeah. I remember.”

***

“We should call your doctor, love,” Nick says, batting at Louis’ wandering hands as Harry laughs, warm and familiar from the other side of the bed.

Louis thinks it’s a good idea for later, when he’s not comfortable and happy in his bed with the two loves of his life. Besides, he’s got lost time to make up for, apologizing to do. 

Louis swings a leg over Nick, straddles his lap in one swift move.

“Later,” Louis insists, even as Nick moans and presses his hips up under Louis’.

“Later,” Nick agrees breathlessly.

***

**Author's Note:**

> //[tumblr](http://fortymaliks.tumblr.com)//[twitter](http://twitter.com/fortymaliks)//


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